A Two City study of Air Quality in Vietnam

世界卫生组织(WHO)将糟糕的空气质量描述为最大的环境健康风险，并将每年800万人的死亡归因于暴露在空气污染中的后果。越南是东南亚增长最快的经济体之一，因此经历了快速的城市化、工业化和人口增长。这导致了空气质量恶化等因素，越南是世界上污染最严重的国家之一，在最近的一项调查中，越南的空气质量在180个国家中排名170位(耶鲁大学环境表现指数，2016)。越南的空气质量监测参差不齐，之前报道的许多研究现在都很过时。鉴于经济的快速发展和胡志明市和河内等城市的增长，迫切需要新的、最新的空气质量测量和重新评估观测到的污染物的主要来源。在这项研究中，我们建议测量越南两个最大城市、南部的胡志明市和北部的河内的一系列空气质量指标，以加深我们对这些对比环境中空气污染浓度和来源的了解。测量将在旱季和雨季进行，当时盛行的风向和可能的污染源可能会有很大的不同。英国集团将把一系列分析设备带到越南，这些设备将补充越南合作伙伴现有的测量结果。这些仪器将极大地改善现有测量的种类，包括关于在气相和颗粒相中发现的有机化合物的详细信息，后者使用新的质谱学检测技术。这将为我们提供显著增强的气相和颗粒物物种数据集，使我们能够使用包括正矩阵分解(PMF)在内的各种数据分析工具，更好地识别对人类健康有利的主要污染物，以及两个城市不同排放源的相对重要性。该项目的一个重要组成部分将是与越南合作伙伴进行知识交流和能力建设。这将包括在英国接待越南工作人员几个月，学习包括粒子过滤分析、空气传感器技术在内的技术，以及使用PMF等来源解析软件。由此产生的空气污染数据库将是越南迄今最大和最全面的数据库，将成为未来空气质量模拟研究、核实排放清单和设计有效减排策略的宝贵资源。为了传播我们的发现，我们将在项目结束时在越南组织一个研讨会，我们将邀请来自不同学术、政府和非政府组织的代表参加。

The World Health Organisation (WHO) describes poor air quality as the largest single environmental health risk and attributes 8 million deaths annually to the consequences of exposure to air pollution. Vietnam is one of the fastest growing economies in SE Asia and, as a result, has undergone rapid urbanisation, industrialisation and population growth. This has led to the deterioration of, amongst other factors, air quality, with Vietnam being one of the most polluted countries in the world, ranked 170th out of 180 countries for air quality in a recent survey (Environmental Performance Index, Yale University, 2016). Air quality monitoring in Vietnam is patchy and many of the previously-reported studies are now quite dated. Given the rapid economic development and the growth of cities such as Ho Chi Minh City and Hanoi, there is a pressing need for new, up-to-date air quality measurements and a reassessment of the major sources of the observed pollution.For this study we propose to make measurements of a range of air quality indicators in the 2 largest cities in Vietnam, Ho Chi Minh City in the south and Hanoi in the north in order to improve our understanding of the concentrations and sources of air pollution in these contrasting environments. Measurements will be made during both the dry and wet seasons when the prevailing winds and likely sources of pollution could be quite different. The UK groups will take a range of analytical equipment to Vietnam which will complement the existing measurements made by the Vietnam partners. These instruments will vastly improve the speciation of measurements currently available, including detailed information on the organic compounds found in both the gas and particulate phase, the latter using novel mass spectrometric detection techniques. This will provide us with significantly enhanced datasets of both gas phase and particulate species which will allow us to better identify the key pollutants for human health and the relative importance of different emissions sources in the 2 cities using various data analysis tools including positive matrix factorisation (PMF).An important component of the project will be knowledge exchange and capacity building with the Vietnamese partners. This will include the hosting of Vietnamese staff in the UK for several months to learn techniques including particle filter analysis, air sensor technology and the use of source apportionment software such as PMF.The resultant air pollution database will be the largest and most comprehensive in Vietnam to date and will serve as a valuable resource for future air quality modelling studies, the verification of emission inventories and for the design of effective abatement strategies. To disseminate our findings we will organise a workshop in Vietnam towards the end of the project to which we will invite representatives from various academic, governmental and non-governmental organisations.